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I received in the post yesterday a small publication on Shrewsbury Castle. The centrefold shows a plan of the town and castle, which I have reduced, scanned and placed below.

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From "The Castles & Moated Mansions of Shropshire", by Mike Salter

Shrewsbury Castle SJ 388206

Shrewsbury is almost entirely surrounded by a loop of the River Severn, and in 1067 William I ordered that a castle be constructed beside the vulnerable neck of land on the north. In 1069, “the Welsh, with the men of Cheshire, laid siege to the King’s castle of Shrewsbury aided by townsmen under Edric the Wild”. The castle held out but the town was burnt as a relieving force got near. William I in 1074 gave the castle to his kinsman Roger de Montgomery, created Earl of Shrewsbury.

The Domesday Book records the recent destruction of fifty-one houses for an extension to the castle, undoubtedly the outer bailey, and a similar number were destroyed to give a clear field of fire around the defences. The castle became royal again when Robert de Bellesme’s castles were surrendered to Henry I in 1102. William Fitz-Alan of Oswestry later had custody of it, and after Henry’s death, he fortified the castle for the late King’s daughter Matilda, in defiance of the new King, Stephen. In 1139 King Stephen stormed the castle, hanging nearly one hundred of the garrison.

The early castle defences were of earth and wood, the oldest stone parts dating from when the castle became royal again under Henry II. The Pipe Rolls record minor expenditure on it in the 1160s and later. A shell keep was built on the mound summit and a modest curtain wall built around the inner bailey. Excavations showed that the now-destroyed outer bailey wall had open backed square towers like those at Dover and Orford. The Welsh under Prince Llewelyn captured both the town and castle without difficulty in 1215, and this prompted the young Henry III in 1218 to have work on a town wall, and a wall on the eastern or river side of the outer bailey. Llewelyn attacked the town again in 1234, and the walls were not finished until 1242, when the Dominican friars were given two hundred cartloads of stone that were left over.

The great wooden tower which collapsed around 1270 must have been inside the shell keep on the mound. River erosion caused the east side of the mound to subside, taking half the summit with it. This necessitated building a new retaining wall on this side, giving the present summit enclosure an odd shape. Edward I around 1288 had the hall block rebuilt and added two round towers on the outer corners. The castle was then neglected for three centuries, being "“merely a ruin” in 1403 and similarly described by Leland in the 1540s.

During the reign of Elizabeth I, the castle was leased to Richard Onslow, and alteration to the top of the hall suggest that for a short while it had a new lease of life as one of the many fine town residences of the local nobility throughout this period. Later it was leased to the bailiffs and burgesses of Shrewsbury. When Charles I came to Shrewsbury in 1642 the castle was too decayed to offer accommodation to the King and his officers.
However, in 1643 Lord Capel, newly appointed Lieutenant General of Shropshire, Cheshire and North Wales, set about repairing and improving the defences of both town and castle. The postern gateway, or most of it, dates from this period, while the main gateway into the inner bailey was provided with a new iron studded gate, still in position, and a barbican with musket loops. Prince Rupert was in command her in 1644 before going north to Marston Moor.
The town was captured in a night attack early in 1645 after the Parliamentary forces under Colonel Reinking found a weakness in the defences. The castle was surrendered a few hours later on terms allowing the garrison to go to Ludlow. Parliament retained a garrison in Shrewsbury Castle throughout the Commonwealth period, and although there were plots by the loyal Royalists to seize it, they came to nothing.

The castle was in private ownership after the Restoration, and by the end of the 18th century Thomas Telford was commissioned by Sir William Pulteney to restore the hall block as a residence. He also built on the mound a little octagonal folly gazebo, named Laura’s Tower, after Sir William’s daughter. The town council purchased the castle in 1924, and until the 1980s used the hall for meetings. It is now a regimental museum and the grounds are open to the public.

From the exterior the inner bailey appears to have survived intact. In fact the west curtain battlements, with their weathered cross-loops, are probably of the Civil War period, and other wall-tops, parapets, roofs and much other architectural detail, are of the 18th and 19th centuries. There were once many domestic buildings scattered around within the bailey, but, apart from the hall, we know only of the chapel of St. Michael near to the mound. The chapel was ruinous in 1395, and in 1605 the Corporation ordered an enquiry into how much stone was being taken from it, presumably by unauthorised persons. The outer bailey has been reclaimed by the town and built over, probably before the Civil War. All that remains of its defences is a short section of walling over 6ft (2m) thick by the river, pierced with the 13th century St. Mary’s Water Gate.

The bailey is entered by a 12th century archway about 9ft (2.7m) wide, set into a wall 5ft (1.5m) thick. There are no traces of a tower here, and the gateway was closed simply by a two-leafed door. In front of the arch there was presumably once a ditch, and there is now a 17th century barbican, the innermost portion of which seems to have been later roofed over to form a porch. Re-set in the 19th century walling immediately to the west is a second Norman arch of around 1200, with slightly finer mouldings. It was probably the chancel arch of the chapel of St. Nicholas, which stood in the outer bailey on or near the site of the Presbyterian Church, and which survived until the mid 19th century. The doorway with an internal wooden lintel at the south-west corner is of the 16th or 17th century. The west wall has a curious salient angle projecting out at the point where the wall of the outer bailey once joined it.

All the castle buildings are faced with sandstone blocks, and the only masonry which is noticeably different is the section which contains the gateway, with rough rubble on the inside. This part may be all that has survived of Henry II’s walls. The remainder is probably mostly of the 13th century above the foundations, being perhaps a rebuilding after damage caused by Llewelyn. The walls are low and only just thick enough to carry a parapet and a wall walk. Even the latter is omitted on the thin section north of the postern gate, and the sections of later date which climb the sides of the mound.

The steps on the eastern walk which are too high to climb without a ladder cannot be of great age. The postern gate measures about 20ft (6.1m) by 14ft (4.4m) externally, with a single room and plain battlements over a gateway passage 7ft (2.2m) wide. The upper parts are 17th century and have plain mullioned windows, but the passage has a portcullis groove and rebates for doors, and must be 13th century work.

Of the 12th century shell keep there survive only the footings of a wall about 4ft (1.2m) thick below the much later parapet facing the bailey. On the east is a retaining wall built in the 13th century to support what remained after the collapse of the mound top, but again the parapet is not old. At the southern end is a two storey folly tower with curved open stairs leading to the upper storey. It lies upon the base of a tiny round late 13th century turret.

No Norman features now remain in the hall block, so it can be regarded as being essentially of the 1280s, with later additions. In the much altered ground floor are a 16th century fireplace and a round 18th century office. Only the unlit circular room 11ft (3.3m) in diameter in the base of the eastern tower now remains in its 13th century state. This level once contained storerooms and a kitchen, unless the latter was elsewhere in a separate detached building. The upper storey now forms one long chamber but originally the western third must have been divided off to form a solar, with two windows in each of the north and south sides. Together with the two polygonal rooms in the west tower, this would have formed a private royal suite with its own private entrance in the tower. Stairways in the west and south walls led up to the bedroom in the tower, and down to the wine cellar below. The solar fireplace is mostly 13th century, and the Y-tracery of the windows no doubt an accurate restoration of the originals.

The hall has always had an entrance where the present one is, and a screened passage, perhaps narrower than the present one. A stairway in the east wall leads up to the top room in the east tower, and there was probably a wooden stairway down to the cellars. The main hall has three south-facing windows and two north-facing, set either side of the now-removed fireplace. In the late 16th century the roof space above the hall was used to create a low storey with the mullion and transom type windows typical of that era, and the present low pitched roof added on. This storey must have been used as a long gallery, as problems of access and lack of light on the north side, would have made using the space as numerous private bedrooms rather difficult.


Plans of the castle, by Mike Salter.

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Some vintage postcards of Shrewsbury Castle, from my collection.

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An engraving of Shrewsbury Castle from England Delineated, 1804.

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